Edmentum's Vision for Edmentum Assessments

I’ve just spent the last few days in extremely thought-provoking, innovative meetings focused on the product roadmap for Edmentum Assessments and our entire product portfolio.  It’s important to step away from the tactical and look at what will significantly impact student achievement and how Edmentum can meet your school’s and district’s needs.    The planning process is a combination of your feedback, Edmentum insight and educational trends and market research.   When I analyze the information from Edmentum’s Strategic Advisory Council and customer survey results, it paints a clear picture that we need to continue to focus on two key areas:

Common-Core Alignment:  It’s a focus for most of us, but without final details released from PARCC and Smarter Balanced, it’s impossible to align our assessments 100%.  We’re committed to continually updating our assessments to align with the most recent information in order to support you in your transition to the Common Core.  In the winter, we’re going to be adding new versions of our Common Core Test Pack which will include new technology enhanced item types.  Allowing for a richer item than the multiple choice question, items such as Drag and Drop and Hot Spot give us many more ways to assess a student’s knowledge of an objective.   

Empowering Teachers to use the data:  What good is a formative assessment if it’s too cumbersome to analyze and use the data?  An effort for the second half of this year is to develop data visualization elements into Test Packs and Accucess to support teachers and instructors in making use of the data coming out of our assessments and prescription content.  The result is less time getting to the data, and more time supporting students who need it.   We’re providing visual graphs and data on student information like login’s and completed assessments, as well as progress data and item analysis. 

I’m not lightening my focus on other needs either, such as state-specific, end-of-course aligned assessments, as well as analysis on the placement of Accucess.   There’s a lot of exciting things coming to Edmentum Assessments and Prescriptions, and we’re making some big strides this year!   If you’re going to be at the ISTE Conference in a few weeks, please stop by the booth and come talk with me.  Your feedback and needs play an important role in determining what we develop next year, and I look forward to meeting you.